It's my party

"Sing along with me, this is 40..." says Bono at the end of U2's 1983 Red Rocks concert, Under a Blood Red Sky. They always used to close with this spiritual hymn of sorts, taken partly from Psalm 40 which is about God putting a new song in people's mouth, and then Bono sort of adds a "but" line to it: "How long to sing their song?"

I have no reason to begin this blog with that, except that as I'm about to turn 40 in a couple days, I find myself longing to have people to "sing along with me". It's lonely to grow older, especially when you feel a strong affinity towards people younger than you, something I've wrestled with all my adult life. I always just enjoy the company of younger people, and yet culturally, I idolize people my parents' age.

It's an interesting time for Richard Linklater's third part in his Before Sunrise/Sunset series to be coming out. Some of my favorite movies of all time, and the most romantic, bar none. It's all about making a connection with someone through talking and listening. (And there may be a bit of sex thrown in for good measure.) And how that connection changes--or does not change--over the course of many years, how aging changing us, but we're still fundamentally the same. People who like car chases and explosions don't appreciate films like this. It's all talk, talk, talk. But one of the best nights of my life (June 1, 1995) consisted of a talk much like the ones in these films, the likes of which I've almost never had again. That this person and I became bitter enemies just a short time later makes it all the more fascinating to wonder what would happen if we saw each other again, after all these years.

Many my age are balding. Many have gained weight, as have I. I look at people I had a crush on in high school and it makes me sad to think how they've declined. And they have families, many of them, kids, and boring jobs, and typical lives that can't be anything close to what they once dreamed of when they were young, lives of distinction, lives that seemed to matter, to make a difference in the world. I'm not trying to put them down; to them, this is what life is about. I hope it's pure joy. But for me, I always wanted something different.

I haven't achieved such a young person's dream life either, but the difference is, I'm still trying. I still consider myself an artist above most all other things. And someday maybe I will be recognized as someone with something important to say and contribute. But will I end up more happy for it than all my classmates who just settled into a life of normalcy? At least they fit in somewhere, at least they feel like they belong to something. They've been in romantic relationships (I have not), they have experienced their own version of the American dream with their house, their car, their career. My life has the appearance of something much more lowly than that, especially for someone my age.

But what matters to me has never really been the same as what mattered to many of those around me. I once joined a church and tried to get to know some of the young men there by emailing them and inviting them to coffee. The pastor, upon hearing of this, acted like I had committed one of the biggest social gaffes ever in the history of man. People don't get acquainted that way. Well, I do. I've never cared much for social rules and pretense, but as a result I've been generally ignored by 95% of the people I ever wanted to get to know. And most people realize we don't choose our friends, but our friends choose us. That doesn't mean I don't love my friends or would not actively choose them now, as opposed to someone else. In fact, I have a feeling if I had the ones I once thought I wanted, they would disappoint me. But life is so much about expectations, and growing older is about the ability to reconcile those expectations with reality. But it's not easy.

So I may cry, if I want to. Because it's my party, and I can.